Organization
Crystal Thai-Cambodian Cuisine
Crystal Thai-Cambodian Cuisine is a Cambodian restaurant on East 10th Street in Long Beach, California, just south of Cambodia Town.[1] It has served the Cambodian and Long Beach communities for more than 15 years, cooking traditional Cambodian food in the style of a home kitchen alongside Thai dishes.[1] Its Chinese name is 水晶柬泰料理.[2]
History
The restaurant stands at 10th Street and Orange Avenue in Central Long Beach, a few blocks south of Anaheim Street on a mostly residential block.[1][3] In 2015 LA Weekly found a small room with a few booths, a serving staff all related to the Khmer grandmother cooking in the kitchen, and a television playing Cambodian karaoke videos on a loop.[4] By 2025 the restaurant was run by Bong Tony, a longtime Long Beach resident, and classic Khmer songs by Sinn Sisamouth, Ros Serey Sothea, Khemarak Srereymun and Boty Phen were often playing.[1] The chef Chad Phuong has said the restaurant is run by survivors of the Khmer Rouge's Killing Fields and that every dish is "an homage to classical Khmer dishes."[1]
Food
The menu is large, covering many sides of Cambodian cooking, with Thai and Chinese dishes as well. In 2015 it held more than 100 Khmer items, from salads and soups to a Cambodian version of balut, each made homestyle in the manner of Phnom Penh.[4][5] The menu includes soups and whole fish.[5] The restaurant serves whole fried Mekong catfish, pulled apart by hand and folded into lettuce wraps with fresh herbs, tamarind sauce and, if wanted, Thai chile.[4][1] The Infatuation noted it served with mango paste.[3]
The restaurant serves beef skewers.[1] Nom p'jok is a bowl of thick rice vermicelli and herbal leaves with a separate turmeric-yellow broth of muddled catfish. Prohok kteh is ground pork cooked with prohok, the Khmer fermented fish paste, and eaten on cabbage with cucumber or African round eggplant and a squeeze of lime.[1] Nom sdao tosses fried fish and pork with greens and sdao, the bitter flower buds of the neem tree. Plea is shrimp, beef or duck feet marinated in lime juice and mixed with cabbage. Somlor machu kreung comes with beef, and intestine and tripe are offered too. There is also cha kroeung.[1] Thai dishes include pad thai, Thai boat noodles and papaya salad, and the kitchen also makes green lemongrass curry with frog legs.[1][3] Iced chrysanthemum tea is served with meals, and sweets are available at the counter by the door.[4][1]
Visiting
The restaurant takes cash only; in 2022 there was an ATM in the taco shop next door.[3][6]
See also
References
- ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 Longbeachize, Crystal Thai Cambodian is Long Beach's Cambodian home kitchen (January 2025)
- ↑ CCYP, Cambodian restaurants in Los Angeles
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 The Infatuation, 10 great Cambodian restaurants in Long Beach (May 2022)
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 LA Weekly, 8 places to eat in Long Beach's Cambodia Town (October 2015)
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Asia Times, A new era for Cambodian culture and cuisine in Long Beach
- ↑ The Infatuation, Cambodian restaurants in Los Angeles (May 2022)